Britain is being left behind in a “gold rush” to China because of poor air links, Heathrow’s chief executive warned today.

Frankfurt and Paris are leaving the London hub in their slipstream as they forge ahead with extra flights to Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, China’s biggest cities, said Colin Matthews.

The two continental airports combined offered 1,000 more flights to the cities than Heathrow in the 12 months to September last year, and another 532 on top by September this year.

“London is already slipping behind in the global race to build connections with important markets like China,” Mr Matthews said.

From the Frontier Economics consultancy, the figures are key in Heathrow’s first dossier of evidence to Sir Howard Davies’s review of UK airports.

Heathrow also argued that a lack of airport capacity, and consequently fewer flights, means far more Chinese visitors head for other European countries. Britain had 147,000 last year, while France hosted 1.2 million in 2010.

The UK’s many enterprising businesses have “the ideas and endeavour to boost jobs and economic growth” said Mr Matthews. “But they don’t have the flight connections they need.”

Paris Charles de Gaulle had 1,125 more flights than Heathrow’s 1,630 to the three biggest Chinese cities in the year to September, while Frankfurt offered 407 extra, said the new report, called One Hub or None. To all mainland Chinese cities, the French and German airports offered 2,200 more flights than Heathrow a year.

Gatwick also opened up a route to Beijing this year, with four flights a week, as it seeks to become Britain’s gateway to emerging economies.

Frontier Economics warned last year that the lack of direct flights to emerging markets could cost the economy £1.2 billion a year. However, John Stewart, chairman of anti-expansion group Hacan, said today: “When they talk about China, they exclude Hong Kong. If you include Hong Kong which is the natural destination for a lot of British business, Heathrow outperforms the other European competitors.”

He claimed that rather than lack of capacity, the “real obstacle” to better air links with China is a bilateral agreement limiting the number of flights to 62 a week. Heathrow also warns that if Mayor Boris Johnson wins his battle to build a mega-hub airport in the Thames Estuary or Stansted, Heathrow will close with the loss of tens of thousands of jobs.

The Department for Transport said: “The UK is one of the best-connected countries in the world. Maintaining that is vital to our economy and history suggests that to do so, we will need an agreed evidence base and a high degree of political consensus.”

Do nothing, and the UK is poised to lose its global competitive edge

Commentary: Colin Matthews

Heathrow is London and the UK’s only hub airport, and tomorrow we will publish new evidence showing just how important a successful hub is for London’s future.

London has been home to the world’s largest port or airport for 350 years. Consequently the world has travelled through London to reach its final destination and our city has become the centre of global service industries like insurance, law and finance.

This competitive advantage will end sometime in the next decade as Heathrow is overtaken by Paris, Amsterdam, Frankfurt or Dubai as the busiest airport for international passengers. Each of these cities competes directly with London for inward investment and jobs. So Heathrow’s comparative decline will make London a less attractive place to do business as we fail to offer the range of destinations businesses need. London is already slipping behind in the global race to build connections with important markets like China.

In a new report out tomorrow we explain how a hub airport works and why it is so important. Unlike at “point-to-point” airports such as Stansted or Gatwick, transfer passengers at a hub supplement the ups and downs of local demand, allowing airlines to fill long-haul flights day in and day out. This allows Heathrow to operate flights from London to global destinations not served by any other UK airport.

Having two hubs in one city does not work. Splitting the pool of transfer passengers available to fill flights undermines airline routes. Tokyo’s attempt to operate hubs at Haneda and Narita airports saw it slip from first to seventh in Asian city connectivity rankings. And New York, with eight million inhabitants, is less well connected to long-haul destinations than Frankfurt, whose population is 600,000.

The Mayor understands the importance of a single hub to London. Last month he said: “There is absolutely no point in simply scattering new runways randomly around the South-East. What this country urgently requires is a hub airport with several runways that will solve the pressing need to increase hub aviation capacity.”

We agree. London and the UK need a single hub. The Government has three options: do nothing and let the UK fall behind; add capacity at Heathrow, or close Heathrow and build a new hub airport elsewhere.